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New Homeland Security unit will battle threats to critical U.S. assets

The Department of Homeland Security is forming a new center to better protect U.S. critical assets — from financial institutions to the energy grid — from cyber and physical threats.

Officials will announce the creation of the National Risk Management Center at a cybersecurity summit in New York on Tuesday, The Hill has learned.

Its establishment comes amid heightened fears of cyber threats to the U.S. energy sector and after officials revealed a broad campaign by Russian hackers to breach organizations involved in powering the U.S. electric grid.

The new center’s goal will be to bolster coordination between the federal government and private sector companies — which own and operate the vast majority of critical assets — and to improve the protection of critical infrastructure from potential threats, according to a document outlining its mission.

Homeland Security has long taken the lead on engaging with private companies to protect organizations across more than a dozen critical sectors — including chemical, manufacturing, nuclear, water and transportation.

Some in the private sector have criticized the federal government for being too slow to share information on potential threats, or not sharing enough.

“In response to the increasingly complex threat environment and corresponding demand from industry for greater integrated support from the U.S. federal government, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is establishing a joint center to provide a centralized home for collaborative, sector-specific and cross-sector risk management efforts to better protect critical infrastructure,” the Homeland Security document states.

The center’s mission, it says, “is to provide a simple and single point of access to the full range of government activities to mitigate a range of risks, including cybersecurity, across sectors.”

The new hub will go beyond information sharing, and will work with the private sector to develop a “collaborative risk management strategy” to help better secure critical assets.

National security adviser John Bolton has also eliminated the top cybersecurity post at the White House to streamline management and reduce bureaucracy, prompting broad criticism from Democrats and some Republicans in Congress.